


[5+1] In Which Ahsoka and Rex Save Each Other A Lot

by zinjadu



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: 5+1 Things, F/M, Friendship/Love, Gen, I think I have a problem, like who else do I write about?, my faves saving each other's asses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-27
Updated: 2016-10-28
Packaged: 2018-08-27 09:51:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8397016
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zinjadu/pseuds/zinjadu
Summary: Does what it says on the label.  How they save each other over the years, in ways physical and otherwise.





	1. Five times Ahsoka saved Rex (and one time Rex saved Ahsoka)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Largely canon compliant, and includes the idea that Ahsoka lives after Malachor, and that Rex is the old rebel from RotJ. Borrows from my other fic, "Lethe", but you don't need to read it. Enjoy!

_1._

 

They never talk about the time she interposed her blade between his head and Grevious’s saber. They were soldiers and saving each other’s necks was supposed to be par for the course. Besides, they had a mission to complete. But when he thought about it later, he thought that might have been the first time someone other than a brother saved his life.

 

He wasn’t sure why that made a difference, just that it did.

 

 

_2._

 

The second battle of Geonosis was a slog. Heavy artillery was in use by both sides, and he saw the rocks tumbling around his position with startling clarity. Without thinking, he shoved the shinies out of the way just in time, and then managed to curl up tight and survive the rocks falling all around him.

 

But before he could panic, the rocks moved and there was Ahsoka, her thin arms held before her and a look of deep concentration on her face. When she saw him stand from the rubble, she smiled. And later, when she had suffered the same fate, he didn’t need Skywalker yelling at him to look harder for her.

 

 

_3._

 

Not all kinds of saving happened on the battlefield.

 

The most important kind of saving came after. After the dead were laid to rest and the fires snuffed out, but the stench of burning bodies still lingered in the nose.

 

Ahsoka saved him after Umbara.

 

Rex would never doubt that.

 

In front of the men he had kept it together. Had to keep it together, but by himself, staring at a blank wall with Krell’s words echoing in his head, he could feel the cracks in his mental armor.

 

Then she was there, her eyes as old as the stars and heart as bottomless as the Kaminoan ocean. She had helped him put himself back together piece by piece with a patience and care that would surprise anyone who didn’t know her well. Didn’t know her like he did.

 

Because she knew that sometimes, people had to be saved from themselves.

 

 

_4._

 

Ahsoka lied to save his life, after Order 66, on Mandalore. She gave up her sabers and her name and everything that she was, after she had already given up so much. He knew what it cost her to do that, but she had insisted, and he had seen the sense in her plan.

 

Even though it cut him to the heart to leave _his_ Jedi.

 

 

_5._

 

As Rex held Ahsoka tightly to him, seeing her for the first time in fourteen years, he knew she had just saved him again. Yes, the rebels needed his information and expertise, but there were others they could have turned to. She had sent the Jedi boys after him because she knew, she always knew, what he needed.

 

He needed to get off that rock, he needed to not fade away. He needed to be a soldier again, to fight for a cause, because it was the very core of who and what he was.

 

So she had saved him yet again, this time from the obscurity that he had once thought he wanted, but knew had always, always been a lie.

 

 

_+1._

 

Ahsoka would never be able to make Rex fully understand just how profoundly had saved her, how by _remembering_ her, he had drawn her from death back into life, had given her a light to guide by. The memory of her time beyond the boundary of life was already fading from her mind, but she would never forget the feel of Rex in the Force, a wordless song of grief and love that had resonated with her very soul.

 

He had shaken his head when she tried to explain, called it _Jedi stuff_ , said that he didn’t care why, only that she was here, now.

 

She supposed he was right.


	2. Five times Rex saved Ahsoka (and one time Ahsoka saved Rex)

_1._

 

Rex had drawn Ahsoka to the side to give her that telling off on Christophsis. The kindest, most respectful telling off she had ever been on the receiving end of, when she thought about it later. She had never held that against him; she knew she more than deserved it for how she acted when she first landed. But she also knew that he didn’t have to keep any one else from hearing it.

 

He had saved her dignity that day, so she could be the Commander she had the potential to be, so she could still earn the respect of the rest of the battalion on her own merits.

 

But then, Rex had always looked out for his Jedi.

 

 

 

_2._

 

Rex caught Ahsoka quickly as she fainted, the Blue Shadow Virus finally overwhelming even her Jedi reserves. All he had really saved her from was a cracked head, which, to be fair, would have added even more time to her stint in medical. But he never would have caught her had he not been paying attention, had he not somehow knew she was pushing herself past her limits.

 

Somehow, he always knew.

 

 

_3._

 

Rex didn’t always have to be around to save Ahsoka’s skin. During their time working and fighting together, she had heard probably every rule of battle that Rex had cobbled together. Granted, he was always making up new ones. Mostly when a shiny did something stupid.

 

And while those rules and reminders had kept her alive more than once, it had been when the Trandoshians had kidnapped her that they really came in handy. Yes, Anakin’s teachings had too, but for some reason it had always been Rex’s voice she heard in her head, telling her to seek safe ground, to consider all her options, to always leave room to move, and create multiple paths to victory.

 

That was why she considered her victory over the Trandoshians a group effort, really.

 

 

_4._

 

Rex shot his brother without a second thought when Order 66 went out. The clone, who had once been a man and was now no better than a droid, had been about to shoot their general in the back. But Rex had been waiting for this, waiting for the other shoe to drop ever since Fives had died in his arms. And he had promised himself no one else he loved would die that way. He hadn’t been able to save his brothers. But he would be damned before he turned on the one person left in all the galaxy he had left to him.

 

 

_5._

 

Seeing Rex again had changed something for Ahsoka. She had missed him so desperately over the years, and she had grown resigned to never hearing from him. It had soothed something in her to know that it had been Wolffe’s meddling that kept Rex from receiving her letters. But now that he was back, she saw in his eyes the young woman he had once known, the young woman who put herself out into the galaxy and fought and strove and was so alive.

 

He saved her from disappearing again, from staying in the shadows, from denying who and what she was. Because his very presence made her feel ten feet tall and so full of hope that she could burst.

 

 

_+1._

 

Ahsoka lived.

 

Again.

 

Rex had found her.

 

Again.

 

Ahsoka had saved him, again. Saved him from staring down a rapidly aging body as he somehow had survived from the Battle of Geonosis to the Battle of Endor. Saved him from enduring a growing uselessness as the galaxy passed him by and turned to Skywalker’s children to lead them out of darkness, without even his brothers to care for and look after now, Wolffe and Gregor both marching far away.

 

She saved him, because she had always held his heart, and now she returned with it in her hands.

 

And they were both alive again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, Merfilly, I hope you are satisfied. ;) 
> 
> Back to Knight-Errant. =P
> 
> ... Okay, this was kind of fun and sweet to write.


End file.
